Recap: Red Wings 5, Blues 1

February 07, 2013|Reuters

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Recap: Red Wings 5, Blues 1

Red Wings 5, Blues 1: Cory Emmerton collected a goal and an assist for his first points of the season and Petr Mrazek turned aside 26 shots in his NHL debut as visiting Detroit snapped a two-game skid.

Rookie Damien Brunner scored his fifth goal and Daniel Cleary, Jakub Kindl and Valtteri Filppula also scored for the Red Wings, who further distanced themselves from a season-opening 6-0 loss to the Blues by defeating their Central Division rival for the second time in a week.

Defenseman Alex Pietrangelo scored his team's lone goal for the second straight contest and Brian Elliott finished with 24 saves. St. Louis has been outscored 16-5 during its three-game losing skid.

Cleary opened the scoring 5:14 into the first period after cleaning up his own rebound. Kindl doubled the lead just 6:36 later after his wrist shot from the point deflected into the net.

The first-period offense proved to be enough for the 20-year-old Mrazek, who was recalled from Grand Rapids of the American Hockey League on Monday. Jimmy Howard was given a breather after starting all nine games for the Red Wings this season.

GAME NOTEBOOK: After being held without a shot in Tuesday's 4-1 loss to Calgary, Filppula gave Detroit a 5-1 edge by scoring on a breakaway. ... Detroit's first two goals provided the initial points of the season for Cleary, Kindl, Emmerton, LW Justin Abdelkader, LW Drew Miller and C Tomas Tatar, who was playing in his second game. ... St. Louis last lost three in a row in regulation during a four-game skid from Feb. 27-March 5, 2011.